Tuesday, 6 August 2013

Disclaimer

Forward, for free hair care product!

Spoilers abound in these posts, if you haven’t read the
books and will get upset by finding out what happens just stop.

This is also not a recap, if you want a recap go to
Lexicanium.

What The Black
Library says about the book

After thousands of years of expansion and
conquest, the human Imperium is at its height. His dream for humanity
accomplished, the Emperor hands over the reins of power to his Warmaster,
Horus, and heads back to Terra. But is Horus strong enough to control his
fellow commanders and continue the Emperor’s grand design, or will such
incredible power corrupt him?

What the book is
really about?

In the most part, it’s about world building and scene
setting.

Not a lot actually happens in the book, sure there are some
action sequences and character development but there isn’t a lot of WHAM BAM
reveals and earth shattering developments. It’s actually a pretty subtle book
that mixes the BIG BOYS COMMANDO ACTION style of 40k with some nice character development
and gentle exposition.

Nothing seems horribly forced and the 30k world is allowed
to develop naturally over the course of the book.

Introducing the Hero-Protagonist

Serious.... serious profession

Get used to this archetype as you will be seeing a lot of it
in the future. Garviel Loken is a good honest humble warrior without delusions
of his own importance. He loves The Emperor, His Primarch, His Legion and the
Imperium in roughly that order. He has a square jaw and a poorly developed
sense of humour. He fights hard but he fights fair and he has the welfare of
his men as a top priority and has a rigid sense of good conduct and honour and
stuff.

Seriously, you should really get used to this type of
character as it will form the template for many other Horus Heresy protagonists.
One of them is even introduced in this book.

What separates Garviel from the pack? Well, he does have
some doubts about things that many other characters don’t consider. After
seeing one of his men fall to chaos possession he has a bit of an existential
crisis and he develops genuine relationships with no less than three non-space
marines in the book.

Yep, even 8 foot tall killing machines have self-doubt, and having
Garviel show this demonstrates his character.

Why are there humans
in my book about super-powered Space Marines?

Well, for the 1st point, so it isn’t 100% a macho,
yet homo-erotic, circle-jerk like a lot of this kind of fiction.

Without the human characters to show contrast and be “real”
any gravitas of the events unfolding would be lost. If everyone in the world is
a colossal Space Marine, you can’t see them for what they are. The human
characters give us this perspective, to see the inhuman monstrousness and grandeur
of the Astartes in human eyes.

And a bonus it also allows the story to have some female
characters… and real characters at that, not just hot boobs in power armour.

This is a good thing unless you are currently sitting in your lounge masturbating to "guns and ammo".

The mechanism used to introduce the human characters is genius.
They are rememberancers, a fleet of artists and scholars sent by the Emperor to
chronicle the crusade. They dodder about, like artists, exploring the ship,
trying to get interviews, taking photos and writing poetry. It’s a nice way to
explain why there is an untrained human at a battle who has to be told
everything from scratch and it’s a tasteful way of dumping a bundle of
exposition needed for world building.

The photographer, Keeler, gets to witness chaos first hand
and to take a photo of it. Her reaction is suitably human and she breaks down
and finds religion as a comfort. This kind of frailty would have been out of
place if every character was a Marine and I think the story is far richer for
including her.

This brings me to the real hero of the book…..

Um officer..... our cat is stuck up that tree......

MVP – Ignance Karkasy

I love this character. Karkasy is an iconoclastic, drunken,
loud mouthed, smart-assed poet with one redeeming feature, he speaks truth to
power. Garviel and Karkasy strike up a fascinating relationship after Karkasy
gets his ass kicked for suggesting the imperium will not last forever. He
serves as a comic foil to the straight laced Garviel, while remaining a
believable and likeable figure.

Worst Character –
Abaddon

Try harder to be bad please!

I was going to say Lucius, but I have plenty of time for
that in later books. What Lucius and Abaddon have in common is that they are
established characters in the 40k universe, and they are bad guys. You almost
feel that the author had to put them in, so wrote them with resentment.

Abaddon is basically Worf…. Or at least a bad Klingon
analogue.

“What should we do Abaddon”

“UGH! SMASH! KILL! SMASH! DERP!”

He’s predictably boring and totally unlikeable, I can see
why all his black crusades fail in the future.

“My lord, it is time for another crusade into the
Imperium, what are your plans”

“UGH! SMASH! KILL! SMASH!
DERP!”

Get to know your
Legion – The Luna Wolves

Right, I still don’t get the Luna Wolves and I’ve always
hated that name. They seem to be good at everything without any real
weaknesses. As fierce as a Space Wolf and as planned as an Ultramarine.

The net result is they end up pretty bland.

The one cool thing they have is the Mournival, a group of
four senior captains who advise the Primarch. This artifice is used in conjunction
with the four humours,

Sanguine (Full of life and energy, HUZZAH!)

Melancholic (Grumpy, moody, perfectionism)

Phlegmatic (relaxed, content, diplomatic)

Choleric (UGH!
SMASH! KILL! SMASH! DERP!)

Each member of the Mourival represents one of these aspects,
with our hero Garviel being the Phlegmatic one. These four voices are balanced by
the Primarch in his decision making process, which is quite a neat concept.
These four humours are also used in most of the books by Marines to describe
their current emotion state.

The Mournival

Get to know your
Primarch – Warmaster Horus

I must say I was a little disappointed with Horus. A big
deal is made about him being the bees-knees but he really comes across as an
insecure stuff-up.

The book has three set pieces and Horus pretty much fucks
everything up on each occasion and then has a cry about how hard being so
amazing is. “What’s this, a planet infested by killed arachnids with no
strategic value; best piss away my forces while ignoring requests from all the
other Primarchs for advice…. Seeing as I’m their boss and everything”.

He also plays some political games using the Mournival, but
it’s Machiavelli 101 stuff. Then he has a cry about it.

I know the Author is trying to show that even the mighty
Warmaster has weaknesses, but seriously.

Why the Emperor is a
giant douche

This will appear in every single book because the Heresy
only happens because the Emperor is a giant douche.

This time around it’s failing to transition power to Horus
with nothing more than an over the top parade and a short speech. He orders and
entire continent flattened for one parade, then says

“Right… I know the war isn’t over but I’m buggering off, I
won’t tell you why, but keep fighting….. oh you work for this dude now….
BYEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE”

It’s like you were in class one day and your teacher
organised a big event, introduced the relieving teacher as Bob, and then got on
his Harley and drove off into the sunset while giving you the finger. No wonder
people though “holy shit…. Is he coming back? Have we been abandoned?”

Probably, and it’s because your god-king is a giant douche.

Gentlemen..... i'm popping down the shops for a pack of smokes.... i'll be right back

Moustache twirling
evil-bastard award - Erebus

Yep.... this guys is initially introduced
as a level headed adviser

Erebus is introduced as an even handed advisor from the Word
Bearers to Horus and later revealed to be a complete cock.

His involvement is small at this stage, but he is pretty
much the only evil character in the story. One aspect of his story is his
involvement in the Warrior Lodges (secret bloke societies of space marines that
Garviel does not approve of but that everyone but Garveil seem to belong to).

He does singled-handily start a war with a benevolent
species however, and for that alone he gets the evil bastard award.

The writing – technical
review and evaluation

This is a good book and a must read for the series, if only
to get the context of the rest of the books. The action schemes are pretty
solid, if that’s what you are in this for, but the real strength is the world
building and characters, specifically the human characters.

It’s not as creative as some of Abnetts later books and I
feel at times he is struggling within the tight narrative guidelines he would
have been given. Oh, I also wished he hadn’t just watched Starship Troopers as
well.

This book gets a “must
read” rating. If you are going to read any of the books, you may as well start here.